Affinity
by Rhavia
Summary: Toko / Just a collection of wee, unrelated, taking-place-at-random times drabbles. - Toko Week 4.
1. Fireworks

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><p><strong>Fireworks<strong>

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><p>Far above her in the sky the fireworks <em>fizz<em>ed up into the air and _popp_ed one by one with little if any linger from silence between them, each and every sound erupting in her ears. They burst into _sizzzzles_ and _ssshhhhs_, catching the attention of the crowd who let out a muted encore of _oohs_ and _ahhs_ in awe.

For her first time 'viewing' fireworks, she had to admit that she was impressed. She hadn't even considered something like them possible before. (Well, going by what she had been told they looked like, they seemed like some absurd experiment by a particular Water Tribe boy.) But the Fire Nation boy had insisted on 'showing' them to her.

She rested her head against his shoulder absently, feeling more drowsy than lively from the atmosphere, and closed her eyes while she listened to their beautifully bizarre sounds.

He'd had a feeling she would enjoy them, even if not for the same reasons he did. They'd always been something he could look forward to as a child. He watched as the dimly sparkling trails exploded with rainbows of colour; reds sprouting to the left on a backdrop of black, green's dotting the sky with twinkles of life like close-up stars, and remains of glittering silver covering the darkness. They spread through the entire vastness of the night with too much to look at before more fireworks followed the first, second, fifth, tenth rounds.

He leaned in close to the Earthbender girl. There was a reason he had brought her to see the show, after all there was a running theme of proposals during the yearly spectacle. He wasn't thinking along quite as large lines as that but he intended to use the opportunity well nonetheless.

"Hey," he whispered in her ear, head close to hers. He waited for the quite _mm?_ of acknowledgement before continuing. "I love you."

She felt a small eruption of feeling in her stomach, almost but not quite like butterflies.

Perhaps fireworks didn't just exist in the sky.

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><p>.<p> 


	2. Sand

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><p><strong>Sand<strong>

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><p>"C'mon, would you hurry up? I'm getting cold waiting for you!"<p>

"Hey! It's not that easy to find where I'm going when I can barely see, okay?" she called angrily to him, navigating her way roughly through the damp sand towards the beach house. He sounded about twenty metres away, impatience in his voice. (She had no clue how far away he _felt_ because this ridiculous _sludge_ she was stuck walking in had thrown her depth perception way out of whack!) Was it just her or had it suddenly become impossibly difficult to walk on this stuff? There was no way the sand had been this much torture last time she was here!

"So it rains a little and suddenly you're completely blind in sand?" he teased. Her eye twitched.

"Watch your mouth, Sparky! I'm not happy as it is!"

He let out a hearty laugh in response. "No need to tell me. I can definitely tell."

She stopped dead. Hearing the lack of _shluch shluch shluch_ that had indicated her wary footsteps in the now-quicksand he turned around to meet her gaze. Only to be met with a whip of sand like a slap in his face. He toppled backwards and tripped. A proud grin spread across her face when she heard the gratifying _schlop_ of his posterior landing in the sandy gloop.

"Wow, get a little sand in your eye and you completely lose your balance. Geez, Sparky."

He made a mental note not to threaten her when any vast form of earth was around, regardless of the apparent earthbending-be-gone powers it seemed to have.

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><p>.<p> 


	3. Foreign

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><p><strong>Foreign<strong>

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><p>She shivered as his fingers tip-toed their way down her sides, cautiously at first but gaining confidence the lower they trailed. Her breath hitched when they then snuck their way under the rim of her top, working their way back up, and it took a few moments before she remembered to exhale again.<p>

He paused, lips slipping away from her neck, and asked in a whisper, "You okay?" He moved to peer into her eyes. She had been... somewhat shy (something he had never thought she could even be _- ever_) and he could feel a slight tingle of fear in his chest that he had done wrong. This _was_ normal practice for a young couple... right? His fingers hovered above her skin now, hesitant.

"I-I'm fine." She tried to hide the slight stutter in her voice to no avail, the stubbornness in her gaze as she looked away a tell-tale sign. "I just... I've never done this before," the earthbender admitted grudgingly under her breath after a brief pause. His eyes widened just that little bit. It hadn't really crossed his mind that this would be her first time doing something like this. Well, besides kissing. Kissing they had down to a T.

He may be comfortable with these things by now, but for her it was foreign territory.

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><p>.<p> 


	4. Mirror

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><p><strong>Mirror<strong>

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><p>"Ow! I thought I told you not to fricken' stab me in the head!"<p>

He saw a wave of black curls in the mirror's glint as she swirled around to face him, eyes glaring daggers in his direction until he removed the pin and backed down more than willingly, staying on the defensive. "I wouldn't have if you'd stayed still like I'd said!"

There was always a risk when she was around mirrors: it could only mean grooming that she didn't consent to. He didn't want to get on her bad side (or rather, unleash it), especially when they were supposed to be in the greatest of moods and on their best behaviour. It was, after all, the Third Anniversary of the War's End. She was already unhappy with all this formality she had to deal with for the evening, so much so that they had almost had to manhandle her into a dress for the occasion; anything else irking her could push her over the edge.

"Whatever, Sparky."

His hands rested securely on her shoulders as he manoeuvred her back to face the crisp, gold-plated mirror towering over the two of them. She let out what sounded like a grunt of defiance, crossing her arms over her chest in a frump. Jade eyes peered through the darkness of the reflective glass until, by some miracle, they pin-pointed his and fixed on him with an icy glower. Ignoring the shiver that shot down his spine - hey, even drowned in several layers of green intricacy, she looked as threatening as ever! - he continued to the best of his ability.

Sitting in front of him she was at least three heads smaller than him. It was strange, really, being around her _and_ her reflection. She had no use for mirrors and thus was rarely seen by one.

"What're you doing my hair for anyway? I thought it was Sugar Queen's job."

He shuddered. It had been the Water Tribe girl's job and here he was ruining her masterpiece. Dear Agni, he was hoping she didn't notice. Or he didn't change it badly enough for her to notice. Actually, he'd only be safe if he was lucky enough for her to _like_ what he was doing to the earthbender's hair and he was no hair stylist by far. There was little hope.

"Well?"

"Oh. I wanted to change something about it," he said, and she cocked an eyebrow in response. Very little hope. Miniscule amounts.

"W-well… I found a hairpiece of my mother's not long ago. It's… jade, I think? It's silver too, really intricate, so I thought it would look nice against your hair. I mean, it's not like I can wear it or anything!" he chuckled nervously and sighed inwardly, carefully weaving strands of her hair around the item and intertwining them underneath. Damn, he hadn't been awkward at all up until now.

"I just, y'know, it's green so I thought… it might suit you."

"… Remind me to punch you later." Her hair slipped out from between his fingers and he looked up to see that she had lowered her head slightly. Her long bangs would usually fall all over and around her face; but with her hair done up, there was nowhere to hide the blossom of pink that bloomed its way into her cheeks.

On the contrary, he decided he quite liked being around mirrors with her.

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><p>.<p> 


	5. Innocence

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><p><strong>Innocence<strong>

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><p>Her hand whizzed past his head in the blink of an eye, narrowly avoiding smacking the right side of his face, as she pointed beyond him toward the farthest corner of the air temple. His eyes followed. Did she have this entire place memorised or something? After all, she couldn't even see right now, let alone know what direction they were facing. There was something odd about this girl.<p>

"Onwards, my steed!" she demanded lively, her voice ringing in his ears. He was ever so glad she hadn't decided to kick his sides with her heels while she was at it; he was no ostrich-horse.

Wincing at the sudden pitch, he headed in said direction. It wasn't as if he particularly fancied carrying the young earthbender around, especially with her strenuous demands. No, he was merely smart enough not to disobey her many commands. She would only jump from his back the instant he did and attack him, which didn't appeal greatly to the young Fire Nation Prince. With his own bending powers currently... unavaliable, he wasn't very likely to prevail in defending himself from her assault. And it wouldn't be overly fun to suffer the wrath of the girl.

He sighed and shifted her weight on his back slightly, trying to rid himself of the numbing feeling that had started to grow over the last few minutes. "Remind me why I'm doing this?"

"Because you burnt my feet," she replied simply, bluntly even, as if the answer was painstakingly obvious. He felt a pang of guilt stab at his chest. He really hadn't meant for that to happen. It was an accident, hadn't she accepted that yet? He took a guess that this must be her form of revenge for that and his face formed a scowl. He picked up the pace, sincerely hoping that this wouldn't become a usual occurrence.

(Sadly, the Prince's hopes were in vain.)

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><p>.<p> 


	6. Waiting

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><p><strong>Waiting<strong>

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><p>"You know, I really am sorry about your feet..." he spoke out, filling the momentary silence with words from a rather touchy topic. He dared the impossible task of meeting her gaze only to give up when her eyes remained fixed on searching the vast azure skies above them.<p>

"Accidents happen, Sparky. Don't worry about it."

While his expression softened with the grin that spread across her rose-tinted lips, he was more than a little narked by the fact that she felt the need to use the nickname constantly. (He wouldn't admit that it was starting to grow on him, though.) His face, however, soon took the form of a grimace when her fist collided with his upper arm. Once again he had failed to notice her impending attack; he always suffered her abuse by getting distracted. And he could have sworn he heard a crack this time.

Rubbing his new wound gently, he risked another look at her. She was completely at ease; legs dangling over the edge of the cliff, head facing the sky as she leaned back, palms resting firmly against the earth to fulfil the role of her feet. She wore a bored expression, though the loose hair from her bun hung over her eyes, long and untameable, in such a way that made it difficult to tell for sure. He had caught himself, on occasion, wanting to free it from its prison and watch it tumble gracefully down her shoulders, her back, so long and so soft. He'd love to run his fingers through it...

He was still watching her in adoration when her milky green eyes locked onto his of tarnished gold. Finding himself arbitrarily transfixed by her sudden susceptibility, it was rather a challenge to hide the blush that spread across his cheeks like wildfire. But just as a book snapped shut, her orbs glossed over with that ever-familiar essence of knowing. His pulse quickened, much to his embarrassment, and he had the sudden urge to run back to the Fire Nation.

Then he saw her lips curve again and he had the sudden feeling that she was teasing him.

_Go on then_.

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><p>.<p> 


	7. Can You Hear Me?

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><p><strong>Can You Hear Me?<strong>

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><p>"I'm beat," the earthbender sighed, collapsing onto the velvet red couch next to her firebender companion. She sank more than willingly into the padded cushions as they absorbed her in comfort, the feel of the smooth, criss-cross patterns weaved into the fabric making a heavenly change from years' worth of paperwork against her fingertips.<p>

Two weeks she had been in the Fire Nation as an Earth Kingdom representative. Two weeks of horror. She had no issues with being there - it was, after all, essentially a holiday for her. She simply had to nip in to visit her Fire Lord friend, share some lovely light-hearted banter, put a few trade route plans on the table while she was at it, and away she would go! Simple!

But her patience was really being tried by this point.

At best, she had learnt that every native of the council rooms had been trained in the secret art of bickering and thought ridiculously highly of themselves because of it. The meetings she'd attended had been nothing but a show of arguments with each nation throwing taunts back and forth like some sort of ticking time bomb. She was waiting impatiently for it to go off so that she could escape but there was the niggling reminder in the back of her head that these plans _had to be made_.

Spirits, why couldn't everything have just been all fine and dandy after the war? Those Fire Nation advisors, they really needed to go—

"It's nice to have a break, isn't it?"

He gave her a small smile, eyes full of the relief they both felt that the most recent squabble-fest was over. She felt her tensed muscles loosen at the sound of his voice and her shoulders slumped into relaxation. This was one of those rare occasions where they had an afternoon of free time; she needed to lighten up!

"Words cannot describe how happy I feel right now, Sparky."

He closed his eyes, let out a breath. "You really need to stop calling me that."

"I lay off using it in meetings, don't I?"

His right eyebrow twitched and he turned on his side to face her, eyes open again. It was so very difficult not to get angry when she was doing everything to rub him the wrong way, especially after being under the close observation of his council for days on end. "That's not the point, Toph." She cocked an eyebrow in his direction, silently questioning what, indeed, his point was then. He could see the smirk playing on her lips and had to bite back a fierce objection to it. "Oh, come on! I haven't heard you use my actual name in... I don't even know how long!"

"No need to get your knickers in a twist. It just feels weird saying it now."

"Toph..." There was an edge to his voice.

_Smack_.

"Ow! You need to stop doing that, too!"

She closed her eyes and flexed her hand. "I punch because I care."

"Pfft, right." He rubbed at the spot her fist had come into brutal contact with and hoped futilely that it hadn't worsened the already yellowing bruise he had attained over the past weeks. It was really beginning to seem like he had some sort of target branded onto his arm; one that, despite her blindness, she always managed to hit when it called out to her in times of boredom.

"I love you really, you know."

Taking this as another attempt to push his buttons, he refrained from rising to the bait and contemplated taking a nap before he was drowned in paperwork that evening that, apparently, should be manageable in half of the time it would take him to finish... "Really."

He opened one eye to peer at her. "What?"

She shifted her weight on the couch and leant towards him. "I said _really_, Zuko."

His name did sound strange coming from her mouth, but in an entirely pleasant way. "I-I know what you said but I... don't foll... ow..." the words ebbed into nothing as she took his hand in hers and his heartbeat spiked up - further and further, the initial reaction causing him infinite worry that she had felt it. The clockwork in his head pieced together what she meant. Tinges of pink erupted across his cheeks and he could picture her smirk before he even saw it. She would be able to _tell_.

A faint smile graced her lips as she confirmed his fears. "I can hear you."

There was a lump in his throat that he couldn't quite get rid of and he merely watched her, almost in a paralytic state, both worried that she had and hadn't understood his reaction. And then she moved and all of a sudden her smile was against his lips and she was close enough that he could see each individual eyelash of hers.

He only seemed to regain control of himself when she pulled away and guided his hand towards the left of her chest. Her pensive eyes met with his.

"Can you hear me?"

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><p><em>Fin.<em>


End file.
